This is an archived version of a Field of Schemes article. Comments on this page are closed. To find the current version of the article with updated comments, click here.
October 12, 2009
San Jose adds NBA to phantom team wishlist
As if San Jose and Santa Clara County didn't have enough on their plate, now the San Jose city council is set to vote on a memorandum on understanding for bringing an NBA team to town, should an NBA team be found that wants to move into HP Pavilion. The San Jose Mercury News reports that San Jose Sharks owner Greg Jamison, who operates the Pavilion, has met with the owners of the Sacramento Kings, though it gave no details of how serious the talks were, and it seems unlikely that the Kings owners would settle for being tenants in a two-team arena when their dreams are still alive of getting an arena of their own in Sacramento.
San Jose chief development officer Paul Krutko said, according to the Merc News, that any new team would require "modifications" to the Pavilion, to be paid for by a "public/private partnership." More details, one hopes, will be available in the MOU, once the council takes it up next month.
Has it ever occurred to you Neil that maybe the Maloof's don't want to be in "Cow Town" Sacramento? And we're not exactly seeing developers/investors tripping over themselves to get in on the CalExpo proposal. Good day.
Posted by Tony D. on October 13, 2009 12:59 PM
Someone in San Jose calling Sacramento a cow town is like the milk calling the udder white.
Posted by Brian on October 13, 2009 01:27 PM
Brian, have you ever been to San Jose? It's no more a cow town anymore than Los Angeles.
Posted by Dan on October 13, 2009 02:08 PM
What I found interesting in this was an intersection of one single date: November 30.
The LOU between Cal Expo and the NBA is set to expire on Nov 30 -- the same date the new LOU with the Tank goes into effect.
I do not see this as a coincidence, but I don't think it's a sign the NBA will pull out of talks with Cal Expo.
OTOH, wouldn't that be a great way to pressure Sacramento? Maybe the NBA says they don't want to extend the LOU with Cal Expo; that'd add a lot of pressure, I think.
Anyway, median income in Sac is $43k, and it's about double that in San Jose. Don't think NBA team owners don't understand that. And given Cohan's current reputation, I'm not sure team owners would protect Cohan's "territory."
Cal Expo is dead. Here comes the pressure to move. The NBA is playing hardball.
That's my take.
Posted by MikeM on October 15, 2009 07:45 PM